Pun Salad

I have fond memories of loving this movie back in the 1970s, Peter Bogdonovich's resurrection of the screwball comedy genre. Now, fifty years later, I still laughed, maybe not quite as heartily as before, but still…

Here's the story: Iowa musicologist Howard Bannister (Ryan O'Neal) comes to San Francisco to learn whether he's been awarded a prestigious research grant from the Larrabee Foundation. (He is investigating whether cavemen were able to make crude music by beating on igneous rocks.) He has his domineering fiancée Eunice (Madeline Kahn) along with him. On the scene comes Judy Maxwell (Barbra Streisand), and she unaccountably falls into love with Howard (literal love at first sight). She successfully inveigles her way into his life, but not without causing much hilarious misunderstanding and impressive amounts of property damage.

A subplot involves four lookalike bags, one containing Howard's research rocks. The others containing top secret documents purloined by a wannabe whistleblower; a fortune in jewelry; and Judy's clothing. And of course they get mixed up. Adding to the hilarity and destruction.

Morbid me, couldn't help but notice that most of the stars here are no longer with us. Still (apparently) alive, however: Barbra, Michael Murphy, Randy Quaid.

I get the feeling the movie is poorly paced near the end, but I still had a good time.

I was in a film-noirish mood, I guess, so I went searching for one I hadn't seen. This 1954 one fit the bill. Couldn't help but notice that it was made a full 10 years after Fred MacMurray came to his bitter end in Double Indemnity. It has Kim Novak as the dame that lures him to his doom, not Barbara Stanwyck.

It leads off with a bank heist, the perps getting away with a cool $200K. (This inflation calculator says that's well over $2.2 million today.) And one of the thieves, Wheeler, also kills a bank guard, who's foolish enough to play hero.

Then there's a quick transition to Fred (playing cop Paul Sheridan) unaccountably picking up Kim (playing floozy Lona McLane). Wait, what does that have to do with anything? It turns out Sheridan is part of the team investigating the bank job; they've determined that Wheeler is Lona's boyfriend. So (apparently this was accepted cop practice in the 1950s) Sheridan was tasked with going undercover and, uh, getting under the covers, with Lona.

(It's the 1950s, so that's not made explicit, but come on.)

So Lona and Paul (a) fall in love and (b) hatch a scheme to entrap Wheeler, and abscond with the bank cash. Things keep going wrong for them, complicating their already complex plans. Paul's cop co-workers get increasingly suspicious. And, inevitably,…

This was Kim Novak's first major movie role. Based on the title, I kept thinking/hoping that she would reveal her truly nefarious scheme to make Paul the patsy, and abscond with the money all for herself, because she (correctly) saw him as an easy … Pushover.

Spoiler: that does not happen.

Old fogy that I am, I couldn't help but think during this movie's lesbian love scenes: Y'know, I don't think they do this for the heterosexuals any more. It's like there's a different set of rules for the ladies-only crowd.

It's co-written and directed by Ethan Coen, half of the Coen brothers. I was inspired to watch it not only because of his famous name, but also his brother's R-rated review, guest-posted at Jeff Maurer's substack.

I liked it OK. Nobody's going to confuse it with Fargo or The Big Lebowski, but it's very deadpan funny. (And also very violent in parts.) It takes some cheap shots at family-values Florida Republicans, but what are you gonna do?

It's a road-trip story. Very-out lesbian Jamie is coming off a breakup with her cop girlfriend; very closeted Marian is tired of fending off guys at her workplace. So they take a "drive-away" job, driving a Dodge Aries down to Tallahassee, Florida. Little do they know that they've been hired by mistake, and they're transporting a briefcase with mysterious contents. And also Pedro Pascal's head, for some reason. And murderous bad guys are on their trail.

A subplot involves Jamie's efforts to get Marian to, um, loosen up. And those efforts are somewhat successful. But Marian also gets Jamie to settle down.

ANother entry in the Action/Comedy/Romance/Dumb Fun genres. Big budget for stars Ryan Gosling and Emily Blunt, but also a lot for (obviously) the spectacular stunts. And I hope Mr. Gosling's eight stunt doubles were also well-paid. This movie will have you sympathizing with their faceless daring.

Gosling plays Colt Seaver, a one-time great stuntman who suffered a grievous injury acting as a double for spoiled famous action star Tom Ryder. Disillusioned, he now works as a valet. But he gets a call from producer Gail (Hannah Waddington) who demands his presence in Sydney, claiming that his old girlfriend Jody (Ms. Blunt) really needs his services on the latest Tom Ryder flick Metalstorm (Described as "Mad Max meets Star Wars".)

Colt is thrust into a convoluted, inexplicable plot. It turns out that Jody had no idea he was coming. Ryder seems to be missing. A body is found, which promptly disappears. Colt's no Sherlock Holmes, and it's pretty clear he's in over his head.

Fortunately, a combination of friends and foes spell it out for him.

I never watched the old TV show on which this movie is based. But there's a nice treat in the midst of the trailers for those geezers in the audience who did.

I might not have watched this movie on Netflix if not for the review from Armond White in National Review. He hates everything! And is this damning with faint praise?: "It’s a crock, but it’s the closest a Millennial film has come to recognizing the existence of the working class."

I liked it OK. And if you're wondering what Mark Wahlberg, Halle Barry, and J. K. Simmons are up to these days… it's well, this. (Also: Dana Delaney, Jackie Earle Haley, Lorraine Bracco.)

Mark Wahlberg plays Mike, a construction worker who's schtupping his old high school English teacher (Ms. Delaney). Out of nowhere comes Roxanne (Ms. Berry), Mike's old high school flame. Who promptly tranquilizes him and swoops him off to London. (You don't expect that sort of behavior from a girl you haven't seen in decades.)

It turns out that Roxanne works for "The Union", a spy organization even more secretive than the CIA. And she's fresh off a disastrous mission where a bunch of her fellow spies were killed, so she's looking for (literal, I guess) new blood. What follows is pretty standard fare, but I stayed awake and interested, which is a good sign.

And there's an obvious setup for at least one sequel. I'm in.

John Woo directing a remake of The Killer ? Free-to-me on Peacock? I'm there! But…

It's set in Paris, and the titular killer is "Zee", played by Nathalie Emmanuel, who does not resemble Chow Yun Fat in the slightest. She is a assassin, working for a French gang leader. Her initial mission is to infiltrate an exclusive dance club, and pretty much kill everyone. But she spares a beautiful singer, who's just blinded in the resulting carnage.

We also meet her ostensible opponent, Sey (played by Omar Sy). He's a cop who doesn't play by the rules, whose gunplay saves lives, but is disapproved by his superiors at headquarters…

Well, you've probably already guessed one trope involved: Contract on the Hitman. There are a number of others, which I won't spoil, or bother to look up.

It is pretty standard R-rated action movie stuff, with some John Woo trademark items. But people looking for some good old over-the-top creatively choreographed ultraviolence as Woo exhibited in his earlier movies will probably be disappointed. (YouTube clips from the old movies are available; there's no comparison.)

Don't want to make a big deal about this, but I was in the mood for some semi-violent mindless fun, and this popped up on Amazon Prime. And I've always enjoyed Awkwafina's movies. So…

Set in the near future, California has taken a desperate step to deal with the fiscal crisis they so richly deserve. Their "Grand Lottery" has a twist: if you murder the lottery winner, you get the jackpot. Guns are disallowed, but otherwise thumbs up. Bolt guns to the forehead seem to be the method of choice, but edged weaponry is also populaar.

Awkwafina plays Katie, who accidentally wins. And near-immediately, and cluelessly, finds herself in deep doo-doo. Literally hundreds of people are looking to do her in. Onto the scene pops Noel (John Cena), who offers her protection. But can she trust him?

Also showing up (eventually) is Simu Liu, who was great in Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings. Uh, playing Shang-Chi. (It appears he also played a Ken in Barbie, which I have yet to see.) (And, oh, it appears that John Cena also played a Ken in Barbie.) (And Awkwafina was also in Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings.)

MPAA: "Rated R for pervasive language, violence, and sexual references". Also some smoking.

They don't make 'em like this anymore. (Well, La La Land, which I liked a lot, but that was, sheesh, eight years ago.)

When I was in Iowa last week, my sister took me to see a small-stage production of The Music Man at the Okoboji Summer Theatre. It was a lot of fun, and I hadn't seen the movie in decades, but I remembered quite a few of my favorite bits: the mayor's daughter saying "Ye Gods!", the mayor's wife saying "Balzac"; Harold Hill's wonderful patter; and early on, the song sung by the townspeople (which turns out to have a name: "Iowa Stubborn"), with my favorite lyric:

Never fails to bring a smile to my face.

And there's something special about seeing The Music Man in Iowa, a mere 117 miles away from Mason City, Meredith Wilson's inspiration for River City. (Thank you, Google Maps.)

Anyway, that caused me to do a rare DVD checkout from the Portsmouth Public Library, so I could compare and contrast. Each had its special qualities.

The stage company did a great job, but they didn't even try to duplicate the movie's "76 Trombones" finale; that would have been daunting.

Since I watched the first two entries in this Big Dumb Movie series (Olympus Has Fallen and London Has Fallen), I figured I should complete the set. Unfortunately, my brain rebelled a little, asking "Why didn't they just…" a lot.

Allan Trumbull (Morgan Freeman) has made it to the presidency! Mike Banning (Gerard Butler) is still in the Secret Service, being considered for the top job. (And he would certainly be more competent than the current occupant, amirite?)

But Mike has continuing physical woes, after beating would-be assassins in previous movies, and losing to the Persian Empire in 300. And (as usual) the bad guys have a nefarious scheme that involves presidential assassination, and (as a bonus) framing Mike for it. A lot of Mike's agents get blown up, President Trumbull goes into a coma, Mike gets arrested. Will Mike escape, save the President, and clear his name? Sure, but it takes a while.

Hey, is that Nick Nolte underneath all that hair and wrinkles? Yes it is!

Jada Pinkett Smith has a small role as an FBI agent who (eventually) uncovers the truth about the murderous gang of assassins. Her response is to chopper into the gang's headquarters with one (1) other agent, with no weapons drawn, engaging in some chitchat with the gang's leader, making it obvious she knows what's going on. This does not work out for her.

Warning: Wikipedia says three more movies are in the works. And maybe a TV series. Maybe multiple TV series!

Pun Son and I were big fans of the movie Twister back in (whoa) 1996 when he was just a young 'un. So going to see this sorta-sequel was a must.

Showbiz note: For a "blockbuster", the 7:30pm Saturday show at Regal Cinema in Newington (NH) seemed pretty sparsely attended. Tickets were expensive, though; might be that people were at cheaper theaters.

The heroine is Kate (Daisy Edgar-Jones); in a short opening scene, she's looking to get her research funded by doing a proof-of-concept of a method to defang tornadoes by releasing some gunk into their funnels. This leads her to take enormous risks which lead to the scary deaths of most of her team. She's left with a lot of guilt.

Five years later, she's on the staff of a weather channel in New York City, far from any likely tornado action. But she's enticed back into the game by Javi (Anthony Ramos), the surviving member of her team. He's well funded, always a sign of something sneaky going on. When she arrives, she catches the notice of Tyler (the ubiquitous Glen Powell), a slick, handsome cowboy type, making a sensationalistic TV series.

In a shocking plot twist, Tyler is not the bad guy.

What follows is a lot of dazzling special effects, and a reminder that, yes, tornadoes cause massive destruction and death. Will Kate finally get her chance to deflate a twister? Come on, you've seen more than three movies, right?

We had a lot of fun.